One language, one subtag

Doug Ewell dewell at adelphia.net
Sat Feb 17 18:08:25 CET 2007


I wrote:

> Not even that.  We don't register macrolanguages per se; what we do is 
> register primary language subtags, some of which correspond to ISO 
> 639-3 macrolanguages.  The only difference between these and all the 
> other primary language subtags is that some (but not all) of them may 
> be followed by an extended language subtag.

Actually, all of this is premature.  Until RFC 4646bis is completed and 
approved, all we can do with regard to language subtags is:

1.  Register primary language subtags that appear in ISO 639-1 and -2, 
with no consideration for, or awareness of, ISO 639-3.

2.  Create and register primary language subtags under very, very 
exceptional circumstances which are unlikely ever to come to pass.

We also:

3.  Create and register variant subtags.

which are more or less directly associated with language.

--
Doug Ewell  *  Fullerton, California, USA  *  RFC 4645  *  UTN #14
http://users.adelphia.net/~dewell/
http://www1.ietf.org/html.charters/ltru-charter.html
http://www.alvestrand.no/mailman/listinfo/ietf-languages



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